I think this should be legally prohibited. Also is it possible to physically disconnected the network modules so they can't send anything?
this post was submitted on 11 Mar 2024
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Privacy
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If it doesn't already, that's probably going to put you in the high-risk group with other car modders.
It will be cat and mouse, but I would imagine for the time being, disconnecting the cell antenna on the board would stop it. Who knows what kind of, if any bullshit extra errors and codes that will keep popped up but I'm guessing if it became a popular thing, they would start making cars that will create bullshit errors and codes. I wouldn't do anything permanent until the warranty period is over.
I can't wait to see tuturials. I don't know much about cars and would love to see people disable these, or perhaps do something malicious. Not that I have a new enough car yet, but I know one day it's going to be unavoidable.
I'm sure it's possible, but I'm sure they've made it as painful as it can be.
Most likely the module, if it is a separate module and not part of the SoC of the infotainment system or whatever, works over CAN bus and the car will throw errors when it doesn't detect its presence, or doesn't detect the SIM card. Might even refuse to start if that module is missing. Might be possible to remove the antenna so the car thinks it's just outside of the service area, but if it's built into the PCB and the PCB is cast into resin/silicone for waterproofing, even this might be extremely difficult. Probably the module is also serialized* so replacing it with a "dummy" module or a module from a junkyard won't spoof the system, either.
*Manufacturers have been serializing even airbags for years, making replacing a faulty one with one from a junkyard impossible.
Maybe we can trick it forever that it is far away from a cell tower. That way the car has to start without connection.
Who knows, maybe they force you to use their app and after driving and connecting to the internet, that sends data back to the manufacturer.
I’m sure it varies widely. In Toyota’s you can call in to disconnect (I did it while waiting for a tire pressure machine) but to do it physically you pull a single fuse and the trade off is losing the microphone.
Others have pulled the dash and disconnected antennae but it just reduces the range of the box since it’s a cellular radio like a phone.
Since Nissan and Kia both explicitly state they reserve the right to collect and sell data about your sex life, disabling the microphone is probably a good idea.
in this case that's Toyota specific and it means likely loss of phone calls on the go (but nothing else) even though the data can't leave your vehicle anymore. It all depends on how they wire up the system. Maybe it's easier, maybe it's tied to something random.
Do you have any resources that I can use to learn more about about removing telemetry from a vehicle? Is there a good forum that could help me potentially do this to my car?
There's no easy one-stop solution since it can vary widely.
I would look at subreddits (yuck, reddit!), or dedicated forums for your model if they exist, you'd probably be surprised what's out there. (Example, there's Piloteers (Honda Pilot), Kia-Forums (Kia), 4Runners and Toyota-4Runner, etc. But information may be scattered.
First objective is figuring out if it's even on your vehicle or applicable. Older 3G radios are done since the networks that connected to them are gone now. My '16 Kia had no cellular radio. Maybe you have an SOS button or they advertise a phone app to control your vehicle remotely?
Edit: And if you can't find specific model/year information for your vehicle, you can look for information for related vehicles and see if it's relevant. Ex: Honda Passport, Pilot, Ridgeline sharing a lot of engineering.
Last time I drove a rental car I was constantly aware that it was probably tracking everything I did, sending that data back to its owners, who would then sell it on to data brokers and insurance companies and whoever else wanted it.
It was sort of tolerable on a temporary basis, until I got to driving along a road where the speed limit had recently changed. The car helpfully displayed what it thought the speed limit was, and suddenly I had to choose between driving safely and driving according to what the computers presumably wanted to see.
Drivers of the world, do not let your cars have Internet access. No good can come of it.
I still have my 2010 Mazda 3. The only tech it has is Bluetooth connectivity for phone and music and some voice commands for calls.
The day I will change cars will be the day my car completely dies and there's nothing I can do about it, or it becomes illegal to drive, or it gets wrecked in an accident.
I don't ever want the new cars. I hate hate hate the stupid touch tablets they've put to control everything instead of physical knobs, and now this fucking crap where your car spies on you and rats you out to you insurance company.
Agreed.
I now need to root my Android and put a new OS so it stops telling Google where I am. I'm slightly afraid as I just want my phone to work when I need it.
I'm sure T-Mobile uses my location data for something too.
Everyone calls me paranoid for even just giving a shit about being spied on. Am I supposed to enjoy getting reamed by the rich?
Later model 3 but definitely lower-tech (has the touchscreen nonsense but no internet or anything) and I plan on running it as long as possible lol
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My auto insurance rose 27% this year. My cars sit in a locked garage 20ft away from me practically all week long as I work from home. I was shocked to find my rates rose so high as I barely even drive at all anymore. Their solution was for me to get their data collection puck. What a fucking racket!
Apparently a part of that is that EVs are more expensive to insurance companies, so they are spreading that cost around.
My insurance jumped by about 20% as well, after discounts from shopping around.
It cant just be EVs, but when i was searching this was the main reported factor.
Or, all the insurance companies just decided to massively bump rates
My understanding is that they all got together and decided to raise rates across the board.
Colluding?
My completely uninformed guess is:
- we all forgot how to drive like normal people during/after lockdowns and,
- cars continue to get bigger and heavier, so accidents are more likely to result in total loss
The reasoning they gave me is exactly that. People driving like crazy post pandemic, and the fact that cars have become exponentially expensive.
Parts are plastic and cheaply made so more shit breaks when you get in an accident.
But you don't have to worry if you got nothing to hide... /s
I've seen people drive. They definitely would want to hide their driving habits from insurance companies
Moving from 64 to 65 also moves you to a different age bracket, I would guess that this is the main reason he saw a general rise on his insurance cost from all the other insurance companies.
True, but the insurance agent told him the spyware report was a factor.
Age buckets are so archaic
I think they totally have the computer power to use an hyper parametric model with each age as own variable. A problem this could had, is that they are not going to be enough older adults to accurately assess the risk of them and the model could end showing that 80yo's are better drivers than 30yo's.
You can use regression splines or lowess to locally weight the areas with low data based on what you do know, it keeps your parameter count down but still performs well even at the tails.
I will end up living in the woods at this rate.
Planet Labs saves an image of the world -- including whatever woods you're referring to -- at 3-meter resolution every day.
I desperately wish I could be satisfied living such a life. I have wanted to disconnect completely for a couple of years already. But I know myself and I know I'd be ill-suited for such a life.
Kinda like those who choose to be in the Progressive Insurance "Snapshot" program where you install an OBD2 dongle that reports a lot of data about your driving habits back to Progressive in the dim chance you drive so well that they will lower your rates.
Surely theres someone who has a rasberi pi that reports fake data to this thing? Yes, insurance company, I drive like a Grandma. You're welcome, now give me my discount.
I feel like fraud is a big risk for, what, less than $100/mo? You can do better.
They're literally an insurance company. They have lawyers coming out of their ears.
I never sent this information to insurance companies. Not my problem if some company tracking me gets faulty info.
Is it fraud? Its your car and your data.
Its not fraud for me to change the user agent of my web browser.
It'd be cool if you could tap into the OBD2 dongle and find what its criteria is that denotes "rapid accelerations" or "hard braking" and them reprogram it to dampen that curve and never report more than maybe 5% less than what would trigger an acceleration or braking flag
We didn't see that one coming huh
Is that the whole text of the article? (paywall) Was there any investigation as to the source of the data on the report? ~~As this is a leased vehicle, I would not be surprised if the data came from a dealer module that they use to immobilize and locate the vehicle if you miss a payment or otherwise violate your lease.~~
According to the report, the trip details had been provided by General Motors
meanwhile I have to pre fill out some forms so the sherrif office can track it if its stolen. It cracks me up how the government getting things is a big deal but corpos then no worries.
Am I the only one who doesn't find this surprising. All these big car companies making drivable spyware and who would probably want that data? Insurance companies. This is why my first car I'm gonna tear out the modem.
I'm not surprised it happened, but a little surprised how quickly it happened. Most insurance companies still offer a plan where you voluntarily plug in a tracker to monitor your driving in exchange for lower rates if you're a good driver, so it's extra fucked that they're doing the same thing to presumably everyone with an internet connected car without even telling them upfront, let alone getting consent.
258 pages?! That's half of MS's office format specification!
Not at all surprised by this. I sold my car a decade ago, I just hope motorcycles can stay dumb for longer.
I work in fintech and I had glimpses of raw API data that credit agencies, Mastercard and LexisNexis provide (among others). It's crazy detailed. Even just our query increases the query count by one and provides at least ten data points on the why and when.
I'm not surprised that the car manufacturers are selling this data to LexisNexis who in turn sell it to insurance companies.
Wrap the modem in tinfoil.
So what's the results? Which generation is better at driving? Which age group is more conservative with fuel usage? Hmm?